At a time when women are no more talking about emancipation, bringing in the same income at home, and have equal rights as men, yet in the number of emails I get from women, many ask me as to why are they still considered to be not as smart as men? Why do women specific magazines focus only on beauty, household tips, child bearing and rearing articles? One reader emailed me to say ,” Sometimes I feel even the publisher of the magazines who run women specific publications want us poor souls to just sit at home and take care of the house and not pursue professions. A publisher should be unbiased.”

Most women magazines focus on the outer beauty of women-how to look young and beautiful and what cream works for you and which one for her etc. They are filled with articles and advertisements on how to cook a decent meal and where to get the best clothes in town along with pictures of beautiful models most intelligent women do not want to emulate knowing fully well that those pictures are all photo shopped.
One of our readers sent us shocking statistics on women and that if the women’s magazines would have been successful, there would not be 3 billion women who don't look like supermodels and only eight who do. Marilyn Monroe would not wear size 14 and that the average woman weighs 144lb and wears sizes between 12-14; as many as 70% of the women who flip through these magazines feel depressed and guilty thus resolving not to look at them again. Two decades ago, models weighed 8% less than average women and today they weight 23% less.

On the other hand, Karen Holbrook who became the 13th president of Ohio State University reported that in 1970 women under 25 constituted just 41 per cent of total students enrolled. In 2000 the figure rose to 54 per cent and today men are forming only 42 percent of the total college students pursing higher education.  As sex discrimination takes a back seat, women are coming out much stronger and many a time even leapfrogging the men to the academic finish.

Let’s be realistic here. How you look and how much weight you carry, can also be a result of genetics and where you live. While the Western world may suffer from anorexia, women living in Africa, some parts of Asia or Latin America where one meal a day is the norm, it is not difficult to find pencil thin women with exposed bones working the fields and the hearth.  Did any of them ever read those women’s magazines and realize that their body shape is in vogue today?

The twenty first century has thrust upon the woman the double responsibility of the home and the hearth, leaving little time to flip through women’s magazines with beautiful models exposing their well toned bodies. Advocates still advice women to devote more time to themselves, yet how many are able to follow through are a moot point. Yet Indian tradition in the name of religion has devoted one day a year-Karva Chauth-when women take some time off from cooking and cleaning and devote time to visiting beauty spas. Again, how many are able to follow through, especially living in Canada, would be good stats.

There are other women statistics that cannot be ignored: More than 70 women a year were killed by their partners in Canada in the year between 2000 and 2006 - five times more than the number of Canadian frontline military and police deaths at the same time. Thousands others are battered and beaten, emotionally abused and sexually assaulted. As many as 100,000 women and their children use battered women’s shelters every year in this country. Dec. 6 is still a date to be commemorated.

So, the next time you flip through those magazines, stop and analyze those pictures and try to understand the expressions on the face staring at you. Most of the time, you will find an average woman being portrayed as a sex object and one with no brains or intelligent human beings. Just remember, they are being paid to be there or paid their way to the page.